In an historic meeting, Pope Francis and Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI prayed side-by-side in the chapel at the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo.
“In the chapel, the Pope Emeritus offered the place of honour to Pope Francis, but he said: ‘We are brothers’, and wanted them to kneel together in the same place,” said Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi, SJ.
The first face-to-face meeting of the pair since the papal election on March 13 began with an embrace at the Castel Gandolfo heliport.
Each wore a simple white cassock. Benedict XVI wore a white quilted jacket against the cool mountain air. Francis was dressed in the white sash and cape of the Pontiff.
After their prayer in the chapel, the two retired to the papal library where they spoke together for the better part of an hour. They then ate lunch with their secretaries.
Father Lombardi did not share any of the content of their confidential discussions, but a Vatican Insider report says Benedict had left his successor a 300-page report to consider.
The report quoted 98-year-old Archbishop Loris Capovilla, secretary to Pope John XXIII, as saying, “anyway, and I’m not referring to the Vatileaks dossier, Benedict XVI has left on his successor’s desk something like three hundred pages written personally to his attention, that’s what they tell me in Rome”.
Reporter Marco Tosatti said it was likely that Pope Francis would be devoting more attention to Benedict’s report than to the dossier on the Vatileaks scandal compiled by three cardinals.
Tosatti suggested that the Vatileaks dossier appeared to be imbalanced in favour of allegations of corruption made by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, formerly secretary-general of Vatican City State and now apostolic nuncio to the United States.
Sources:
Image: CTV News